


lashes

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Aftermath of battle, F/M, Future Fic, Touch-Starved, War, atmospheric weather, melancholic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-19 19:40:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17007945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: He told her that she should leave it, that she didn’t need to come here. Maybe he was right, but it hadn’t seemed so at the time. No. No, at the time, it had been of the most vital importance that she come here. That she see what had happened here, learn the truth of it for herself, shape it with her own mind and hand and actions. “I know what doing penance looks like,” he’d said in the aftermath. “This won’t help.”





	lashes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ReyloTrashCompactor (NextToSomething)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NextToSomething/gifts).



Rain lashed the humped, rolling plains outside the lean-to, the droplets pounding against the thatched roof above Rey’s head. The wind threatened to part the oilcloth she’d hung up over the opening of the shelter. It did little to stop the wind that whipped the frayed edges of the fabric, but it mostly kept the inside dry. Every so often, lightning lit the sky, silvered the tall grass and painted the heather in a flashbulb glow. It should have been beautiful. Her knowledge of storms was limited to the scouring punishments that Jakku doled out, the more pleasantly finicky weather patterns of Takodana, the sometimes biting cold of the blizzards that plagued Hoth Two, Not To Be Confused With Hoth, But So Much Like Hoth That We Call It Hoth Anyway.

This, though, was brutal on a level Rey’d never experienced. It was lonely and wanted you to know it, striking you in the chest with that isolation. She pressed her hands to the stone floor and closed her eyes and reached out. Though a thousand different plants grew in the acidic soil, though creatures scurried across the ground and burrowed in the dirt and winged across the skies, though the seas raged against the nearby cliffs, full of fish and whales and visited by gulls and cormorants, she felt nothing here but pain and fear, death.

At least, she’d felt nothing but pain and fear and death before Ben came back.

The land was painted red with blood and toil, the only fruits of war that could buy their freedom from the First Order. She still wished there’d been another way.

She shouldn’t have come, but it had called to her with every bit as much power as that cave on Ahch-To.

Ben had said as much to her when she’d taken hold of the shuttle’s controls the second time, once the battle was done. He told her that she should leave it, that she didn’t need to come here. Maybe he was right, but it hadn’t seemed so at the time. No. No, at the time, it had been of the most vital importance that she come here. That she see what had happened here, learn the truth of it for herself, shape it with her own mind and hand and actions. “I know what doing penance looks like,” he’d said in the aftermath. “This won’t help.”

“I don’t need penance,” had been her only response, spoken viciously and barbed with poison. She’d spat it out between them, left it there to fester in the soil. It was lucky that nothing would grow out of it. He’d reached for her then, but she’d flinched away from his touch, had wanted nothing to do with him. A mistake, that. Perhaps her greatest mistake. Now that he was here again, had given her apologies and explanations in the rain, she was glad he’d come, though she didn’t yet know how to say it. The words, though simple, wouldn’t come.

If she concentrated, she could pick out the wreckage of downed TIE fighters and X-wings, already rusted through and buried beneath foliage and overgrowth to become homes for hundreds of creatures. The bones of soldiers and pilots alike littered the plains, also buried, charred and decomposing, becoming something new. Perhaps it should have been a comfort to her. This place said life went on just as easily as it had proved death a cheap and easy commodity, but that knowledge did nothing to warm her. Her lessons on Ahch-To had been more comforting and that was saying a lot.

“Rey,” Ben said, reaching for her. His touch was cool against her arm and she shivered at the contact. But she didn’t pull away from it, no. She couldn’t. Every inch of her clamored for that touch, grounding and soothing, so much more than she’d learned to expect from the desert that raised her and the war that honed her into a weapon. That the touch belonged to Ben Solo was a cosmic joked played on her and her alone, but she found she did not mind as much as she should have. “We should start a fire. Before it gets too dark.”

“No, I—” She shook her head and scooted toward him. That wasn’t what she wanted right now. She didn’t want to see the inside of this hut any more clearly than she already did. But it was already cold and would only grow colder. A fire would be necessary soon. There was no point in fighting it. “In a minute.”

For now, she pressed herself back against Ben, released a sigh as he drew his arms around her. The breadth of him felt like a furnace against her back, all the warmth she’d ever need, a startling counterpoint to his hands. It made her grateful. That he would come with her at all was a miracle. That he could still feel this way was something akin to a special intervention from the Force. She didn’t think it was possible after everything they’d been through, the fact that she’d been willing to part herself from him at all, all in the hopes of finding—something, peace maybe, or purpose again. She could learn something here, she just didn’t know what or how or when.

And until she did, she could not leave.

He pressed a kiss into her wet, tangled hair, hot as a brand against her scalp. She was on the verge of asking him to do it again when he raised his hand to her chin and tipped her head up. She had to twist her body to accommodate his wish and her heart thrummed anew. His mouth trailed a curving line down her face, stopped at her temple, the corner of her eye, her cheek, the corner of her mouth, before he finally pressed his lips against hers. As close as she was to him, it didn’t feel like enough and as she moaned in pleasure, in hope that he would give her more, she pulled herself even closer to him, her hands tightening into fists around the thick fabric of his tunic.

He remained steady throughout; he had, over the years, become the steadiest thing in her life—a surprise to both of them, no doubt. He might as well have been a brick wall for how easily he withstood the onslaught, like she could climb right over the top of him without ever fearing that he might waver under the pressure, might not be able to hold her up.

His mouth opened under hers, as she finally got herself twisted around so that she could straddle his thighs, give herself better position. It was easier this way to graze her palms over every inch of him that she could ever hope to reach. As they kissed, the sound of thunder retreated and even though her eyes shouldn’t have been able to fully shut out the light, she didn’t notice it when lightning lit the world on fire. She couldn’t feel the weight of thousands of souls pressing against her awareness of the place.

The only soul she felt was Ben’s and that wasn’t so very different from the usual.

When Ben tried to pull away, she curled her fingers into the back of his neck, pulling at the dry, soft strands of his hair. “We’ll catch your death,” he said, firm, a quaint possibility, like she hadn’t packed along a medkit that could handle anything these wilds saw fit to throw at her. Besides, she didn’t feel the cold now, not anymore. She’d grown used to it. The Force was her barrier. “At least light the fire. Or let me.”

But she still didn’t want to, didn’t care about the damned fire at all. She was plenty warm as she was, thanks much, and it would be her decision when she decided she had enough. “Ask me to stop then,” was all she could say in response, because that was the only thing that would turn her from her current path. “If you don’t want me to—”

He sighed, frustrated, and dropped both of his hands to her shoulders, chafing her skin. The fabric of her tunic remained sodden, clammy to the touch. It weighed heavily against her. He was right, maybe, to insist that she light the fire, but that didn’t matter even to the most rational parts of Rey’s brain. Ben was here and she would have as much of him as he would give for as long as he would give it. That was her only concern.

She would know the shape of him by touch alone and yet she couldn’t stop herself from wanting more. That was her burden; it was her curse. Perhaps a better Jedi would have excised that need, but she couldn’t.

This was the only thing she had left that she truly wanted and he could take it from her in an instant.

But he said nothing, didn’t tell her to stop, didn’t force her to light the fire that he was so adamant about having. Relief cascaded through her as she realized he wouldn’t take this from her, too. With a shaky breath, she wrapped her arms around his neck, held fast and tight to him, still shaking. She would always shake, she thought, and did not quail as much at that as she should have.

There was nothing here but him and that was okay.

She swallowed and closed her eyes. Her forehead found the juncture between neck and shoulder and rested there as she breathed. It calmed her, having him so close. He was so warm.

It had rained during the battle, too, that last battle, the one that had decided the war, had ended the First Order once and for all. She remembered that now. Strange that it was only just coming back to her, the rain. And how every stalk of grass had been trodden into the mud.

It wasn’t like that any longer. She’d watched it grow back up, strong and flexible, swaying constantly in the breeze, dotted with blue and purple and red flowers. It was beautiful in its way, though she hated it. She wished she could leave, but not yet.

“Ben?” she asked, not quite sure what it was she was asking for.

“It’s okay,” he replied. With a careful wave of his hand, the fire she hadn’t wanted crackled to life inside the circle of rocks nearby. No ashes yet marred the floor, but it was only a matter of time now before they did. “We don’t have to leave until you’re ready. I’m not planning on going anywhere.” She heard what he didn’t say: _I won’t let my anger get the better of me. I won’t be impatient. I won’t try to argue you back to New Republic space until you’ve done what you need to do._

He hated this place, too. All of the survivors did. But he apparently loved her more than he hated it because he came back. For her.

The pull of her need for him was as strong as an ocean, the tide of it washing over her at every moment. Before, she’d crashed against its shores and thought herself lost, led astray. One moment she would be fine. The next, overwhelmed. With Ben here, she felt none of that rocking motion. All was steady. All was normal. She could accept the fact that she couldn’t leave yet, not until she understood what kept her here, what lesson the Force wanted to teach her, as long as he was here.

There was a time when she’d sensed his indecision and knew him to be conflicted, split in two. Now he was whole and present and more real than he’d ever been before. Though he might flicker, the flame of his heart was true. It kept her warm, that flame, and she felt as though she were truly alive in the presence of it. This was who she’d always known he could be.

Another flash of lightning struck the ground outdoors, close enough that the crack of contact perfectly mirrored the clap of thunder. Though she was used to it, she felt Ben flinch against her. “It does that sometimes,” she said, and didn’t add: all the time. Ever since that day on the battlefield, people falling on both sides, it seemed the rain fell. He would learn. She could teach him how to not be afraid if he wanted it.

It wasn’t so difficult to survive out here on the plains.

“I’m glad you’re here.” Her legs ached as she stretched herself up to capture his mouth with hers, but it was nice to tangle them together with his anyway. And maybe what she really meant was _everything will be okay._


End file.
